The Nintendo 3DS just got its first system update in 9 months

The Nintendo 3DS has received a new system update, its first since November 2020.

Version 11.15.0-47 is available now, and according to Nintendo’s patch notes it brings little more than “improvements to system stability and usability”, a phrase Nintendo often uses during minor system updates.

Dataminer OatmealDome has investigated further and says the patch seems to have updated the handheld’s recovery mode.

It has also reportedly updated the Internet Browser, which OatmealDome suggests may be an attempt to fix an exploit.

This system update is the first since the 11.14.0-46 update, which went live on November 16, 2020, around nine months ago. It too simply claimed to offer improved system stability.

Before that, version 11.13.0-45, released in December 2019, fixed an issue where StreetPass wouldn’t work in some cases.

One would have to go back six years to March 23, 2015 for the last major system update that did more than improving system stability. This let users save Home menu layouts, improved the Theme Shop and added an Amiibo Settings option for some 3DS models.

Nintendo officially discontinued all models of the 3DS in September last year, confirming that production had ended earlier in the year as all attention was being placed on the Switch.

According to Nintendo’s financial reports, the 3DS had sold 75.08 million units worldwide as of the end of March 2019, but that number had only reached 75.77 million by the end of March 2020.

In March this year, Nintendo Japan officially stopped repairing broken 3DS and 3DS XL units, three weeks earlier than it previously announced it would. The company announced that it had already run out of the parts it needed to repair the systems, and so it can no longer repair any more handhelds.